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The fact that celebrities have used IVF and surrogacy to have babies seems to make it much more acceptable for ordinary citizens to use these treatments as well. Even more importantly , infertile patients themselves are much more willing to discuss their problems with others.

I was recently reading an article online about film stars who have used IVF in order to have a family.

In the past , when celebrities underwent medical treatment, this was often a closely guarded secret, which they did not share with the rest of the world. It's therefore heartening to see that film stars are willing to be much more open about the fact that they are using technology in order to complete their families.

These articles are very good for IVF clinics, because infertile couples become aware that there are now many treatment options available to them. Whenever one of these articles is published , there is a flurry of queries from infertile patients , who want to know what we can do for them. The fact that celebrities have used IVF and surrogacy to have babies seems to make it much more acceptable for ordinary citizens to use these treatments as well. Even more importantly , infertile patients themselves are much more willing to discuss their problems with others. After all, if film stars can do so openly , then why can't they? This has helped to reduce the stigma and shame of being infertile.

However, sometimes these articles can be a mixed blessing for doctors because celebrities will not provide the gory medical details of exactly what treatment they have used. Thus , for example , older women who have had multiple pregnancies have had to use donor eggs in order to get pregnant. While it's true that it is no one else's business as to exactly what particular treatment they have utilized, the downside of this secrecy is that other older women have extremely unrealistic expectations as to what the technology can do for them. Not every older woman is willing to use donor eggs , and reading these highly edited success stories sets them up for a lot of disappointment when they have to confront the reality of declining ovarian reserve with advancing age. Even worse, many older women put off having babies after reading these stories , because they feel that if older celebs can have babies after 40, then so can we , so why should we worry now?

This is true for surrogacy as well. Patients who have had a miscarriage get the impression that if a celebrity needs to do surrogacy just because she has had one miscarriage , then this must be the best treatment option for them as well. A lot of them start clamoring for surrogacy, even though this may not be the best treatment option for them, and it takes a lot of patience to explain to them that surrogacy is an expensive and complex treatment which is best reserved for women with a damaged uterus, rather than being overused as the final common pathway to treat problems which could be resolved with much simpler and less expensive methods.